(Continuedfrom page 116)
article in NATIONAL GEO
GRAPHIC magazine in 1962,
prompted an almost instanta
neous influx of boats and divers,
putting new pressures on the
underwater environment. A few
divers might have caused little
noticeable disruption, but safer,
less expensive equipment and
more leisure time helped popu
larize scuba diving.
Pennekamp, beautiful, acces
sible, and irresistible, became
one of the most frequented div
ing destinations in the world,
with nearly two million visitors
a year (half of whom actually
make it onto or into the water).
The five most crowded reefs at
tract 3,000 people on an average
day and double that on warm
weekends.
Their boats pollute the water
and everything in it with petro
leum products and sewage.
Incompetent operators crash
into the reefs. They litter the sea
with plastic foam cups, alumi
num cans, glass, plastic bags,
bottles, and miles of tangled
fishing line. This debris does not
go away-it is, for all practical
purposes, indestructible.
Thousands of swimmers rou
tinely bump, scrape, and step on
coral. To a tired swimmer,
standing on coral may seem as
harmless as resting on a rock.
But the slightest contact by a
foot, boat shoe, dive tank, or
swim fin can weaken a section
of living reef. Algae then over
come damaged polyps. If only
one person in a hundred scars or
Death can be shockingly swift in
a coral reef that took some 6,000
years to grow. Thirty feet down
in Molasses Reef, boulder coral
(top, at left) and branches of
elkhorn, at right,were suffering
in 1983, but much of the area re
mained alive. Just six years later
the boulder coral was seriously
eroded, and the elkhorn had
nearly succumbed.
breaks off a piece of coral that
took a century to grow, the
cumulative devastation is enor
mous. Although spearing and
specimen collecting are prohib
ited in the park, they continue
illegally to this day.
PEOPLE PRESSURE makes
money for Randy
Pegram, operator of the
private park concession
responsible for getting half of
all the area's visitors onto the
water. In his tiny dockside office
he still worries about their
impact. "The place is literally
exploding," he says. "Over half
the growth in the last 25 years
has occurred in the past six.
We're 'maxed out' every other
weekend. Pennekamp has to
close the gates because there's
no more room for cars."
Parking-lot size seems a
strange way to determine how
many people get in. Carl Niel
sen, then Pennekamp's ener
getic park manager (he has since
changed jobs), agreed: "I'm not
sure we want to bring in more
visitors. We keep an annual list
of 'destruction to natural fea
tures,' which includes boat
groundings, mangrove damage,
coral breakage, and boat-prop
dredging. There was an increase
of nearly 300 percent of such
incidents between 1984 and
1989. We may soon be forced to
close off parts of the reefs on a
regular basis, to give them some
breathing room to recover."
Fishing and diving, two main
water sports in the keys, have
conflicting goals: One enthusiast
wants to catch what the other
wants to see swim free. Killing
major game animals is not
allowed in other state or
national parks, but the argu
ment for prohibition falls on
deaf ears when the issue is fish
ing; nearly every resident has a
boat and rod. Anything that
affects recreational or commer
cial fishing polarizes the keys,